Tonight in corporate worship they played a clip from “Prop 8, the Musical” in which Jack Black pretends to be God and quotes some Bible verses wildly out of context. I’m still chewing on it. I can’t get my mind around, “wow that’s how the worlds sees God and those who follow Him.”

Here’s my notes:

On Friday I passed my second certification test. I’m now CompTIA Network + certified. The last two weeks on the road to this cert were pretty brutal. The class was rescheduled six or seven times amongst a lot of transition and drama at work.

On Monday I start another cert class and it’s feels like I haven’t had much of a chance to breathe. I’ve been so immersed  in the world of TCP packets and routable protocols that I almost forgot.

I forgot why.

Why am I doing this?

At times it seems we all get so busy running down the path we lose track of the reasons we chose that path in the first place.  My new buddy Chris helped me remember. He asked me a great question,

How does your passion for the lost manifest itself in your everyday life?

And that’s the real deal. The reason I’m on this track of technology certification isn’t because I love computer networking (although I do.) It’s not to advance my career, to make more money, or be more valuable at work – although these are benefits of the work I’ve put in. It’s really all for God’s Glory.

There are people who are lost and Jesus is the deepest need they have. But no one is bringing Jesus to them. My technical knowledge and career path will (and already has) put me in touch with people who need Jesus and that opportunity is why I’m working so hard.

Sermon Notes March 22, 2009

We just got back from court and Eve-Marie is now legally my daughter! We’ve always been a family from the day Sarah and I got married, but now it’s official. It’s been a long and crazy journey to get here – none of which I’ve blogged about, but now that we’re finally here it’s amazing.

We thoroughly prepped Evie for court to ensure she’d show politeness to the Judge. Our lawyer told us what the questions would be -

Judge: Would you like me to make this man here your daddy?

Eve-Maire: Yes sir!

But he didn’t ask that!!

Instead he asked, “What do you think of this man here?”

We hadn’t prepped her for that.

Evie, thought for a moment, and then went on and on about how happy I make her and how she feels when I’m around. Sarah started to cry. Then the Judge almost started to cry!

It was awesome.

Afterward we ate some skittles, and we’re out to Chic-fil-a tonight to celebrate!

You can read Sarah’s post about today here.

Today I led worship in Kidstown (the children’s minstry at SC3) I had a blast – along with getting to hang out with my daughter I got to wear this cool lanyard:

Today we sang

• Pharoah Pharoah – old skewl bible camp version
• Your Name – Paul Blaloche

At Summit they do Big Idea style ministry (which makes me absolutely love the children’s ministry!) Right now the adults are going through Exodus, so the kids are too. It’s pretty rocking to read the Bible together at home as a family and have it tie into what’s going on in corporate worship on Sunday in ALL the evironments.

More worship setlists from today here.

I played electric guitar today at SC3. It was a blast, here’s the set -

• The Lovliest Sound – Starfield
• Glorious – Tomlin
• Take my Life – Tomlin
• Surrender - Jeremy Camp
• Let it Rise – Holland Davis

Man it was nice being back on stage to help lead worship again. Today was probably the most laid back experience I’ve ever had playing on any worship team I’ve ever been on. They just have their stuff together at Summit. There’s lots of folks on the team who have been doing it for a long time and everyone was so professional. (The Drummer today actually played Djembe in the Elder’s living room at the very first service 5 years ago when the church was planted.)

I LOVE playing guitar 2. Today we had acoustic and lead electric along with my rhythm electric. This is such a fun position to play because you get to add a lot of nuanced parts. The main structure of the song isn’t relying on your part, but it just gives the mix that little something extra. It’s like being the special sauce.

Let it Rise really torn it up today. They rock pretty hard most Sundays at Summit but this song just took it to the next level. At rehearsal Patrick, our worship pastor, said to the lead gutiar, “You have the GREEN LIGHT – I wanna hear Def Leapord going on during this song!” It was tons of fun and the people were just lovin’ it.

Of course we all know God smiles when he hears guitar solos in church

Check out more setlist mainia at Fred McKinnon.com

So the blog’s been low-key recently. I’ve been  studying like a mad man. After getting a 100% on my CompTIA Security + certification exam my next goal is to get a CCNA cert. (Cisco Certified Network Assistant.)

This one’s a lot more invovled.

You need to know how to “subnet” to be a network admin. On the Cisco Learning Connection they have video games to help you learn networking. Today I tried out the Subnet Game and made it onto the leader board. (If you can count by 16s you can do alright at this game.)

I was pretty pumped.

Do you use LinkedIn? My younger brother, Don, is a professional in the Staffing/HR industry. He swears by LinkedIn as his networking tool of choice. I’ve built some great networks through blogging, twitter and facebook, but I’m starting to see some unique abilities of LinkedIn that have piqued my interested in using it more frequently.

3 Reasons to get more invovled on LinkedIn:

1. Business Oriented: While twitter and facebook can focus much on the personal side of life, LinkedIn cuts the fluff and focueses on business. If you’re looking for a webdesigner to help with your the launch of your campus you don’t have to wade through pictures of thier last camping trip to get to a person’s credentials.

2. Value Beyond Each Contact: LinkedIn uses “3 degrees of separation” to connect you with folks. This is its true power. You not only get to connect with a contact, but also with everyone they know and everyone they know. The contact you are adding may not have the knowledge or skills you are seeking, but odds are they know someone who knows someone who does. This makes it valueable to add people as contacts even if they have small networks and little experience in your field.

3. It’s Not Just About Finding A Job: While the primary function of LinkedIn seems to be able to find jobs or recruit employees it’s value goes far beyond. It’s a source of information. If your looking to findout who the experts in an industry outside your own are it’s easy enough to find some folks through LinkedIn and then ask them. You can use it to find someone who knows any type of information your a looking for (or someone who knows someone) inside or outside your instudry. The same types of searches just aren’t available to your on facebook.

You can find my profile here:

http://www.linkedin.com/in/billychia

If you haven’t signed up for LinkedIn you can do so here.